The Wellbeing Series

Since 2012, the University of Minnesota's Earl E. Bakken Center for Spirituality & Healing has hosted wellbeing thought-leaders to inspire and educate the community, organizations, and life-long learners through the Wellbeing Lecture Series.

Past speakers like Brené Brown, Atul Gawande, Dessa, Celeste Headlee, Rhonda Magee, and Jon Kabat-Zinn have explored a range of topics including purpose, vulnerability, food and wellbeing, gratitude, technology, and mindfulness, among others.

Discover more about your own wellbeing with us through the Wellbeing Series, an opportunity to engage, learn, and experience what wellbeing means to you.

To make disability-related accommodations, please contact the Bakken Center's community relations office ([email protected], 612-625-8164).

2024 Wellbeing Series

The Impact of Trauma on Health and Wellbeing and How to Heal featuring Nadine Burke Harris, MD, MPH

Tuesday, October 1, 2024; 12 to 1:30 p.m. Central; Online via Zoom
 
Award-winning physician, researcher, and public health leader Nadine Burke Harris is dedicated to serving vulnerable communities and combating the root causes of health disparities, which includes understanding the link between trauma and health outcomes. Research shows that early traumatic experiences can cause a prolonged stress response that ultimately leads to an increased risk of diseases, including heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. As California’s first-ever Surgeon General, Dr. Burke Harris helped guide the state’s COVID response by successfully launching a first-in-the-nation statewide effort to train over 20,000 primary care providers on how to screen for Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and respond with trauma-informed care. In this talk, she will  outline evidence-based practices you can adopt to regulate the biological stress response and improve health outcomes. Not only will you understand the impact of trauma on health and wellbeing, you will know how to heal.
 
Dr ..Harris smiling at the camera with a grey background

Dr. Nadine Burke Harris is an award-winning physician, researcher and public health leader who has spent her career on the front lines of some of our world’s most pressing public health challenges. As California’s first-ever Surgeon General, she helped guide the state’s COVID response, co-chairing the committee to recommend vaccine allocation and helping California achieve the lowest cumulative mortality of any large state.

Dr. Burke Harris’ career has been dedicated to serving vulnerable communities and combating the root causes of health disparities. In 2011, she founded the Center for Youth Wellness and the Bay Area Research Consortium on Toxic Stress and Health, leading the first-ever randomized-controlled trial to validate ACE screening and assess treatment of toxic stress.

Dr. Burke Harris’ TED Talk, “How Childhood Trauma Affects Health Across the Lifetime” has been viewed more than 10 million times. Her book The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity was called “indispensable” by The New York Times. Dr. Burke Harris is the recipient of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award presented by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Heinz Award for the Human Condition.